Okay, so buckle up. This thing's happening. The script has been started already: James Mangold will write and direct. Given that this is the anthology film that is furthest advanced, it seems likely that this will be the third anthology film, with a 2020 release.

This seems a terrible idea to me in that it would be destroying any remaining enigma of a character whose appeal always relied partly on mystery.

Having said that, I dare say that Mangold will do a good job of this and that the movie itself will be fine.

It will be interesting to see whom they cast.

Young Boba was played by Daniel Logan in Attack Of The Clones. Boba was a clone based on the template of Jango, played by Temuera Morrison. Logan and Morrison are both Maoris and speak with NZish accents, both in real life and when doing these roles.

Lucas had Morrison redub Boba's lines for later editions of The Empire Strikes Back, and he's voiced both Boba and Jango in several video games. Daniel Logan has also voiced Boba in the Clone Wars TV series.

First thoughts might be that Logan (who is now 31 years old) could play Boba in the movie. Honestly ... he's not great. Morrison is an acclaimed actor and obviously it would be nice for continuity if he were to be cast, but at 57 years old there might be some questions about whether he can pull it off. I suppose they can do great things with make-up and CGI patching.

I'm not someone who is firmly oppose to race-shifting recasts. I mean it is not as though the notion of Maori or Polynesian means anything within the Star Wars universe. But for me it would be ... awkward(?) if they cast a white actor in this role. Like if they'd cast Donnie Yen to play Lando in Solo. For me it would have to be someone with at least some kind of similar racial type.

Fun fact: Morrison is playing Aquaman's father in the upcoming movie. Hopefully this will be better received than his previous appearance in a DC movie.

Han's story didn't even use his first name, he gets called Solo more than Han. Much less love for him! Compare to Ben/Obi Wan as "Ben"/"Obi Wan" and only Kenobi/Kenobi in formal terms. We even know Lando overwhelmingly as "Lando" and doesn't suffer "Calfragiilisticexpialidociouswhatever".

Compare R2(D2), the favoured one, and (C)3PO the annoying one. In this universe, maybe not others

I still go by the theory that when the prequel movies come out, it will be revealed that Obiwan was actually OB-1, and that the Sith were secretly cloning Jedi to create an army, and that the reason Obiwan viewed Anakin as a friend was because Anakin managed to save OB from destruction before (or causing!) his descent into the Dark Side.

I'm not much of a Star Wars fan in general but Boba Fett's popularity in particular has always been a complete mystery to me. How did some faceless dude with not even five minutes of screentime before his ignoble death become so interesting to the fans?

As to the lack of excitement for Solo, a straight up failure is too much to hope for but maybe it will underperform.

maybeagnostic wrote:I'm not much of a Star Wars fan in general but Boba Fett's popularity in particular has always been a complete mystery to me. How did some faceless dude with not even five minutes of screentime before his ignoble death become so interesting to the fans?

Fair points, he's not all that. I think the main points of appeal are:1/ Cool outfit.2/ Confident enough to sass Vader, even make demands, showing no fear at all.3/ Pretty sneaky in being able to surreptitiously follow the Falcon to Bespin. 4/ Mysterious! Til the prequels.

As to the lack of excitement for Solo, a straight up failure is too much to hope for but maybe it will underperform.

In fairness, I think that the May release was a bad idea. They'd done pretty well with their Christmas releases, whereas now they are competing in a sea of big budget movies.

maybeagnostic wrote:I'm not much of a Star Wars fan in general but Boba Fett's popularity in particular has always been a complete mystery to me. How did some faceless dude with not even five minutes of screentime before his ignoble death become so interesting to the fans?

As to the lack of excitement for Solo, a straight up failure is too much to hope for but maybe it will underperform.

Boba Fett, in part, benefited from the unknown. Cool and mysterious can go a long way, if done right. I agree that the prequels pretty much ruined anything there as far as coolness goes.

Anyways, I did watch Solo, on the basis of having a three day weekend and a moviepass, so it not costing anything other than two wasted hours of my life. I have regrets.

It's not the may release. Everyone's trying to be all "oooh, two star wars movies too close together can't work", feh. Black Panther was still in theaters when Infinity War came out, and the two films made roughly ALL the money. This is mainly because people liked Black Panther and Infinity War.

Solo Spoilers/Rant:

Spoiler:

Alright, so, remember how when people watched the Last Jedi, and were confused that suddenly the plot revolved around fuel, which Star Wars hadn't really given two craps about previously? Ended up seeming like a really hamfisted explanation for a tediously long chase scene? Did you, after watching that, think to yourself "Gee, I'd really like to have a film, made in the style of the prequels, focus on fuel and fuel production"?

No?

Shit. You're gonna have trouble with Solo.

One does wonder how, with one fuel refinery, and one fuel mining world, the entire galaxy is supplied, especially given that both such worlds are treated as out of the way povertytowns people rarely visit. The difficult is increased by the fact that the Unobtanium literally explodes if it's in a ship longer than some vaguely defined plot convenient time that is significantly shorter than the distance between these two worlds. Unless, of course, you do a kessel run shorter than anyone does. That's super convenient for Han, because we already know how that goes, but doesn't really explain...anything.

Most of the things in this film, you're going to know how they end before they even start. Not because the film explains plots heist style, because it doesn't. You usually have no idea why they're here, stealing this thing from...someone. Heists are not well laid out. No, you know what's gonna happen because they rely on very, very cliche things.

Remember how in every film with poker in it, you have a scene where the hero makes a lot of money, then foolishly bets it all on one hand, confidently reveals a hand he believes to be winning, celebrates, and then is taken aback by the other chap smugly revealing a better hand?

We have that scene. Twice. Once wasn't enough.

It's okay, though, because the first one doesn't actually matter. Despite betting stuff he doesn't have, and losing, nobody cares, and he gets what he wants anyways. Apparently scum and villainy really are good hearted sorts who don't expect you to pay up on lost bets, but will cheerfully pay up themselves.

No actual consequences are imposed on heroes for frank stupidity other than what they do to themselves. Seriously, the big bad has...a knife. Not like, a lightsaber-knife or force skills or something. He's just an elderly guy with a knife against a team of folks with an unreasonable amount of guns and explosives. He does have scars that glow red when he's pissed though, and he offs underlings for trivial things, that's how you know he's evil. Obviously he's going to forgive the heroes far greater failings though, because screw consequences.

Movie thinks human/robot relationships are edgy, and that Lando having capes is a hilarious joke....okay.

Lando at least is well cast. Han is not. He doesn't feel like the later character. In fairness to the actor, this is at least in part the screenwriters trying desperately to portray him as competent and spouting off all kinds of things. Comes across more geeky than roguish.

Yknow how the trailer indicated that he joined the imperial pilots, and got kicked out for shenanigans that went horribly awry? Sadly, those happen offscreen. Nobody wants to see anything involving a war in the stars here, folks. Best we skip that idea altogether.

It was nice of them to include a tribute to the career of Harrison Ford. Would have been better if they'd picked literally anything other than the Crystal Skull.

Possibly had more wookie on wookie moaning than the christmas special. Also, more wookie sexual objectification than anyone without a fursuit is probably comfortable with.

Also, while tying in to the main universe is probably a good idea, dragging out Darth Maul is a dubious choice. Either it's set in episode one, in which case the choice to have the Empire control everything and have star destroyers everywhere makes very little sense, or somehow Maul survived being bisected and thrown into a reactor core.

In fairness, reactor cores now appear to be quite safe, as a main character doesn't mind putting his face into an active one, and doing the equivalent of warboys blowing fuel into the engine, which makes a ship drive with all of the speeds.

One of the most brilliant cinematic choices here was to comment on the state of the star wars universe with a five minute shot of watching everything circle the drain.

I think Savareen is just the closest refinery, not the only one. If I squint at the script a bit, Kessel could be the only place they could reasonably get the unrefined fuel, not the only place that the fuel is mined. Presumably the other sources refine the fuel on site or something, or Kessel may be the only mine that isn't under Imperial control or something.

Also, Darth Maul surviving has been canon since the Clone Wars show was made part of the new canon. I have commented many times that no one dies from falling in the Star Wars universe. Reactor, bottomless and sarlaac pits especially seem to have magical healing/regenerative powers.

Other thoughts:

Spoiler:

I also assume there's some way to stabilize the unrefined fuel for transport (otherwise, why mine it on Kessel at all if you can't refine it there?), but then why don't they steal or otherwise acquire a ship with the stabilization equipment?

But yea, Kessel being the only place they could steal this unrefined fuel makes no sense and commits the capital offence of shrinking the universe. Everybody already knows Kessel is famous for its *spice* so if you want to tell a story about the Kessel Run, then why go to all this effort to contrive a fuel heist? If you really need that ticking clock, the unrefined spice could be volatile and need to be specially prepared or stabilized within some short window. It would make about as much sense and wouldn't needlessly overburden Kessel with important plot stuff.

It was similarly gratuitous to have this one job seem to be the origin of all the Millennium Falcon's quirks.

The scene with Maul and Qi'ra seemed to be doing some heavy foreshadowing, but I'm not sure what it could possibly be foreshadowing, are we gonna get 'Crimson Dawn: A Star Wars Story' after Boba Fett? Is Darth Maul gonna show up in Episode IX?

Roosevelt wrote:

I wrote:Does Space Teddy Roosevelt wrestle Space Bears and fight the Space Spanish-American War with his band of Space-volunteers the Space Rough Riders?

Eh, could start one, but I think so long as it's spoiled and labeled, it ought to be alright. It looks as if Star Wars is attempting to milk the franchise money Marvel style. Not really the first time, of course, but they're definitely aspiring to a lot more films and characters.

@Tyndmyr

Spoiler:

I think Savareen is just the closest refinery, not the only one. If I squint at the script a bit, Kessel could be the only place they could reasonably get the unrefined fuel, not the only place that the fuel is mined. Presumably the other sources refine the fuel on site or something, or Kessel may be the only mine that isn't under Imperial control or something.

Also, Darth Maul surviving has been canon since the Clone Wars show was made part of the new canon. I have commented many times that no one dies from falling in the Star Wars universe. Reactor, bottomless and sarlaac pits especially seem to have magical healing/regenerative powers.

Solo discussion:

Spoiler:

That is possible, but even so, the Kessel-world, reasonably speaking, should have either a closer refinery, or the route between them ought to be entirely normal. It's strange to justify an active mine making a substance that goes boom if transported too far, out of the range of all refineries. Even if Savareen is not the only one, the fact that it's the closest, and is too far unless one does something nobody has ever done, makes this...extremely weird.

Now, maybe someone can postulate some sort of unmentioned technology to ship the fuel safely, but it's certainly never brought up in planning, despite the problem being thought up then. Seems odd for them to not even give it a thought. The whole fuel thing seems tacked onto the universe to justify The Last Jedi, in the end. Narratively, we don't really need fuel in particular, it just serves as a macguffin for the most part. I'm with you on the spice being a lot more consistent.

As for the impermanence of death...ugh. Yeah. Bringing people back via clones or what not is definitely a thing. Losing a hand seems to stick in this world, but losing your entire body does not. It's...odd.

It definitely seems like they want a sequel, and to build some kind of interlocking stories or some such. I agree that mostly this was pretty heavy handed. Probably not gonna watch Boba or whatever else is next. Even at the price of free, some films just aren't worth it.

Starting at the end, I definitely agree they want to do some kind of Red Dawn story. You figure they were stealing from the empire they can't exactly be buddies with the emperor despite their clearly sithey ways. Boba Fett could clearly get involved with them as well. Timeframe wise this seems to all be between episodes 3 and 4 (rogue one, fett, solo). So rather than drag in Vader, the Emperor, or Joba these moves seem to rely on Tarkin, Maul, and similar small scope villains.

Solo itself I thought was OK. I admit this thread lowered my expectations some which generally helps (I still swear I Robot is a great movie if your expectations are crap). Solo shoots first, of course. He didn't misspeak nonsense when he made the kessel run in a shorter distance rather than a shorter time. Fuel was always a limited thing for the rebellion. They seem to make these moves more to address previous movie plotholes than any other purpose (Rogue one was making a movie to explain a thermal exhaust port etc).

I've basically changed the fuel limited scenes in The Last Jedi to something more like Battlestar Galactica's plotline with lots of little jumps they have to make but don't get away with for any length of time. It makes it easier to swallow. All those jumps burn through fuel at amazing rates not seen elsewhere in the plot history.

mosc wrote:They seem to make these moves more to address previous movie plotholes than any other purpose (Rogue one was making a movie to explain a thermal exhaust port etc).

I haven't seen Solo, and I don't care much about Star Wars anymore. I just thought I'd jump into this thread to say that I'm glad they're at least trying to resolve some of those past plot holes. As a casual fan of both Star Wars and Star Trek, I can say that they both have some of their potential ruined by glaringly enormous plot holes and inconsistencies in continuity. They can hardly be blamed, since these are HUGE franchises that have gone through many writers, and writers have to keep coming up with new ideas to keep audiences entertained, so it's no wonder that over the years and through multiple rewrites, there have been some inconsistencies. But I'm intrigued to see if and how they can manage to make the fictional universe more consistent, although I'm relatively certain that discerning geeky audiences will always manage to scrutinize fiction enough to notice the writers' oversights. They can at least try to wrap up loose ends before it resembles the tangled mess that is comic book continuity.

TBH I'd rather have the creative sometimes-mess of the prequels than the clinical drywall patching of these standalones. Sure, it gave me a little angst that Leia remembered her mom, but it's not a crippling inconsistency.

Something from the BBC review of Solo, "devotees will appreciate every line of dialogue that echoes something they’ve already heard a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away." I want to strangle critics that write things like this.

There's a certain amount of freedom involved in cycling: you're self-propelled and decide exactly where to go. If you see something that catches your eye to the left, you can veer off there, which isn't so easy in a car, and you can't cover as much ground walking.

was good enough. The action was exciting, the jokes worked. It hit all the nostalgic notes but was still original and creative and subverted some expectations. I would happily watch again.

I still don't think Alden was the right choice, so I'm opening a kickstarter to replace him with Anthony Ingruber by CGI.I was pretty content with Glover's Lando.Also, it didn't make sense to me that he'd just hand over tens of millions of credits worth of goods for a noble cause. He's not that guy. He becomes that guy in ANH. (Shrugs)

My young son went insaneballs batshit when Chewbacca came on. Hopping up and down on his seat... dude, some decorum.

Pretty ballsy to make in on-screen canon that Maul survived. Shouldn't he go see the Emperor about a job? He's still a powerful Sith.

Yea, despite my criticisms, I actually kinda liked Solo, I think I liked it better than Rogue One. I think part of it may be that my expectations were set more by having read the 'Han Solo Trilogy' books from the Expanded Universe than anything else. And compared to those books 'Solo: A Star Wars Story' barely tells you anything about that Han Solo guy, why, it doesn't even explain how he got the stripes on his pants!

There is one thing the books do better than the movie though:

Spoiler:

The Kessel run was a spice smuggling job, not some wacky fuel heist. Of course, the Kessel run in the book has other problems. The same run where he broke the '12 parsecs' record was also the one where he dumped his cargo, putting him in debt to Jabba. Also, according to the book, when we see him in A New Hope, he had apparently just returned from that very job, like at most a few days before, so how could he expect some random guys in a bar to have already heard about how the Millennium Falcon had done the Kessel run in less than twelve parsecs?

I think Alden did a good job, I suspect most people who don't like him have more of an issue with the script he was working with than his actual performance.

Roosevelt wrote:

I wrote:Does Space Teddy Roosevelt wrestle Space Bears and fight the Space Spanish-American War with his band of Space-volunteers the Space Rough Riders?

EdgarJPublius wrote:I think Alden did a good job, I suspect most people who don't like him have more of an issue with the script he was working with than his actual performance.

Depending on who you believe, they either brought on an emergency acting coach for him or for the entire cast(including him).

So, despite generally feeling that people ought not blame actors for a shitty script, there might be some merit to criticizing individual acting in this film. Contrast against, say, Rose from the Last Jedi. I'm not overly fond of the role the script gave her, but any failings are clearly baked into the script, not her individual performance, so it seems a bit harsh for folks to be beating up on her online.

Tyndmyr wrote:. Contrast against, say, Rose from the Last Jedi. I'm not overly fond of the role the script gave her, but any failings are clearly baked into the script, not her individual performance, so it seems a bit harsh for folks to be beating up on her online.

I'd say the same for Hayden Christensen. He can act. There's nothing wrong with his performances in Shattered Glass or Life As A House. No one could have read those lines in AOTC and not sounded ridiculous.

If a script is terrible enough, there's no real way for an actor to save it. Particularly because they're also subject to directing limitations. Generally, I think a director or scriptwriter bears a lot more responsibility in general. Unfortunately, the actor is the visible face of it, so they catch the blame.

It may be a while before we see any more movies like Solo: A Star Wars Story out of Lucasfilm. Sources with knowledge of the situation tell Collider that Lucasfilm has decided to put plans for more A Star Wars Story spinoff movies on hold, instead opting to focus their attention on Star Wars: Episode IX and what the next trilogy of Star Wars films will be after that film.

Of course, they could merely be re-evaluating what exactly went wrong with Solo and attempt to fix that.

Either's fine, so long as they're fixing things. I don't particularly hate star wars, and it'd be nice to see it hit a level of consistent quality akin to the MCU or similar. That's a hard thing to pull off, but hey, at least they seem willing to maybe give it a go?

I have yet to see Solo, but I think much of the problem is that in a cinematic universe of infinite potential, where any number of stories can be told about new characters in truly weird and exotic places, audiences are simply weary of returning to the intimately familiar. I want to see movies set in the Star Wars universe filled with new characters, new places, and new stories. I think a lot of Star Wars fans would be more excited about that than a Han Solo film or a Death Star rehash.